Elvira Dyangani Ose will not continue at Macba
She has been appointed artistic director of the second Abu Dhabi Biennial of Public Art
BarcelonaElvira Dyangani Ose will not renew her contract as director of the MACBA when it expires in September, after five years at the helm of the museum. The announcement was not made by the MACBA itself, nor by the museum's consortium, which is institutionally led by the Barcelona City Council. Instead, it was implied in a message Ose posted on social media, where she stated that she would "support the museum team and its governance with her usual enthusiasm and energy until the summer." Museum sources confirmed to ARA that she will not continue in the position, but will remain to ensure a smooth transition. The director has not yet made any further statements.
The announcement comes now because the art curator has been appointed artistic director of the second Abu Dhabi Public Art Biennial, which will open this fall and run until 2027. Ose will hold both positions during this period. This is the second change at one of Catalonia's major art museums this week, following the announcement that Emmanuel Guigon will be replaced by Rosario Peiró at the Picasso MuseumAfter ten years.
The MACBA is a consortium involving three public administrations (Barcelona City Council, the Generalitat of Catalonia, and the Spanish government through the Ministry of Culture) and a private foundation (the MACBA Foundation). Ose arrived in 2021 with the challenge of revitalizing the museum, recovering audiences and revenue, and opening the new building, following the tenure of Ferran Barenblit (2015-2021), marked by the expansion crisis and a subdued end due to COVID-19. Barenblit succeeded Bartomeu Marí, who had resigned after another crisis stemming from a censored exhibition.
Ose has implemented a significant exhibition program (the latest example being the exhibition Projecting a black planet(and also exhibitions of Catalan artists such as Mari Chordà and Jordi Colomer), but the new venue is stalled and the budget has been an obstacle. "If we want a top-level museum, we must also have a top-level budget," He said in his last interview on the ARAAnd he stated: "We want to be like the Tate Modern or MoMA, but for that we first need the budgets and also a different kind of governance." Specifically, he called for a new legal structure that would be more operational than the consortium and for the board to include more art professionals, independent of the consortium members and from the international sphere. He also stated that he has made the museum "more porous and more humble."
The change of direction will take place in the year of the museum's 30th anniversary, which has had six directors so far: Daniel Giralt-Miracle (1988-1994), Miquel Molins (1995-1998), Manuel J. Borja-Villel (1998-2007), Bartomeu Marí (2008-2015), Ferran Barenblit2 (2021-2026).
